Silent Angel, Prodigal Son
by LadySkywalkerKirkland
Summary: At this point, Padme Amidala didn't expect to fall in love, not after everything she'd believed in had been all but destroyed. Certainly she would have laughed at the idea of falling in love with a presumed-dead Jedi castaway. And the castaway in question never expected to be given a second chance - at life, at destiny, and at the love he thought had long forgotten him...
1. Prologue: Fall

**Disclaimer: **I am neither Disney nor George Lucas, and am not wishful, expectant, or _accepting_ of profit from this work (except for reviews and happiness). Thank you and do enjoy.

**A/N: **Here, have an early Christmas AU. Leave a review!

**Next Morning A/N: **I ought to have mentioned this last night, but I was really tired. The major difference in this AU is that the mission to Ansion went long and Obi-Wan and Anakin were not available to accept the mission to guard Padme. However, the Clone Wars still began (after all, they had been planned for a long time). The War proceeded about as usual, except for all instances in which Anakin and Padme were specifically sent on missions together. In fact, by the end of the war, due to different circumstances and meetings, Padme actually knows Ahsoka better than she knows Anakin - more on that later.

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><p><strong>Prologue: Fall<strong>

_"__In light of the unfortunate recent tensions between our Order and the Galactic Congress, which have been brought to our attention through several incidents, the High Council of the Jedi Order would like to extend a new hand of friendship and partnership to the Senate and its head. A seat in this Council has, as has happened far too often over the course of the past three years, become unexpectedly available in the last few weeks. We propose that our two organizations renew our commitment to cooperation by creating a new position – the Senate Liaison Chair of the Jedi High Council. While the Jedi Order has acted with a great deal of autonomy in our private affairs for centuries, we understand that the past centuries have also been free of galactic war, and that such devastating conflicts require complete honesty between partners in the struggle for peace, and require each body also not to look solely to its own interests. The appointed Councilor will become the bridge between our two worlds. They will represent the interests of the Senate and the Office of the Supreme Chancellor in Council meetings and will in turn report the content of these meetings back as a means of accountability between our two ancient institutions._

_ "__A list has been prepared of ten Masters who are currently or have recently been under consideration for Council seats. All have agreed to come before the Senate to speak for themselves if you require it. Know, however, that the assignment of our Council seats is not treated like your elections. They will not attempt to sell themselves, but will instead provide you with a clear picture of their beliefs and values, especially with respect to the war, and the assignment the Senate agrees upon will be accepted by all with humility and dutiful gravity, as is our way. You may also propose a Jedi not on this list to the Council, though we respectfully ask that you limit your total period of review to one week after the motion to create the Chair has been passed, and that you adhere to the traditional values of the Jedi hierarchy in that you select a Jedi who has been granted the rank of Master within our Order…"_

With effort, Jedi Knight Anakin Skywalker kept himself from violently thumping his fighter's control console with his mechno as he and his squadron did another pass over another mountain range of a frankly boring moon looking for Separatist hideouts that probably didn't exist.

That position should've been his.

Even several full days after the Siege of Coruscant had been lifted, Anakin remained on-planet, ordered to take a week to not only rest, but also to refresh his knowledge of the war's progress on the large scale by taking advantage of the capital's central military command and intelligence centers.

That was when the Supreme Chancellor had called him to the Senate Offices to make the proposal.

Palpatine's suggestion that Anakin represent his Office on the Council had been more than unexpected, and Anakin had been in shock for few moments, overwhelmed by a tide of jumbled feeling. There had been the usual flustered, slightly embarrassed pride at the Chancellor's high opinion of him as a Jedi – after all, it's not like he got many sincere compliments from the people in his life, the uncomfortably fervid hero worship of the faceless masses notwithstanding. That had been coupled with a warmth of happiness at having earned Palpatine's personal trust to such an extent. But there had been pessimism too, a bit of logical, realist squashing of hope.

The Council barely tolerated him. Many of its members distrusted him – and for what? Because Yoda hadn't been able to foretell the future of a nine-year-old boy with perfect clarity? And even many of those who grudgingly admitted to his abilities disliked him.

There were a few who seemed alright enough.

Master Yoda treated Anakin the same way he treated everyone else, though Anakin wasn't sure if that counted for anything, because, really, no one but Yoda really knew Yoda's thoughts. Although, truth be told, in some of the old Grand Master's more eccentric moments Anakin doubted even that.

Kit Fisto had always been friendly in their few casual interactions. But then, Kit Fisto was jovial with everyone.

And after having spent a couple of years as the Master of Ahsoka Tano, Anakin imagined that his friendship with Plo Koon was a little like what it might be like to have a favorite uncle, the reserved and mysterious Kel Dor Jedi having continued to keep a watchful eye on the little Togruta girl he'd found well into her apprenticeship, and always keeping judgment-free advice at the ready for her woefully inexperienced young mentor.

It had only been about six months since she'd walked away from him down the Temple steps, but she still refused to contact him. Anakin knew she wanted to be able to start a new life without constant reminders of the horrible end of her old one, but this was taking things a bit far. She was still in contact with Master Plo, though, and while, respecting her request, Plo had declined to give Anakin her comm channel or current address, he had also kept Anakin more-or-less fully informed of how she was doing and what she was doing (_against_ her wishes), and Anakin was grateful for that.

And there was Obi-Wan, of course. Obi-Wan was a given.

So that was two Council Masters that liked him and two that were ambiguous.

That left, since there was currently a seat open, a grand total of _seven_ Masters who would rather the Force never be brought to balance than it be brought to balance by him.

Some of them were sort of civil about the way they expressed that opinion. Others not so much.

Saesee Tiin and Ki-Adi-Mundi were of the habit of reciting basic Jedi teachings to him rote, as they would to a small youngling. Apparently they were of the mind that if someone didn't accept those teachings at face value, it must be because they'd never heard them before, not because they legitimately held a different opinion.

Shaak Ti's eyes flashed with irritation every time he opened his mouth, like she was deciding whether or not the Order would be best served by chucking him off the pinnacle of the Tranquility Spire.

He didn't even want to think about Mace Windu.

It was just as well that the cynical little voice in his head had spoken up to temper his hope, since the Council had done more than deny his request. In fact, they had turned the request back on the Chancellor, specifically pointing out certain Jedi traditions as if to say, "Skywalker's not an option, no matter what you think is best."

One would think that someone the Chancellor trusted on both a personal and a professional level would be better suited than a stranger, but no.

Sitting in his Temple quarters, he found he was only able to listen to the first few minutes of Master Windu's address to the Senate before hurling the innocent datapad across the room to crash with a sickening crunch into the opposite wall. Hoping to keep his pet projects in peace (some of the parts had been rather hard to find), he spent the rest of the evening relieving the Temple inventories of quite a _lot_ of training remotes of various difficulties before returning to collapse to sleep in an exhausted heap. Though he knew from experience that weariness and dreamless sleep only took the edge off of bitter resentment for a little bit, it was better than nothing.

The next day Anakin found himself on his way back to the Outer Rim to rejoin the fleet, now tasked with taking out a new series of completely automated Separatist mini space stations, refueling and auto-repair waypoints in an out-of-the-way sector, where the Seps were testing a new line of hyperspace-capable vultures, and wouldn't it just be _fun_ if he got out of their hair for a while and stopped causing political tensions with his unacceptable Skywalkerness?

And they wondered why he didn't want to be them when he grew up.

As if he wasn't grown up already.

Anakin tightened his grip on his controls, neatly banking his fighter into a gentle turn to avoid a very obvious, large mountain, which was the closest yet the survey of this moon had come to "interesting."

Having discovered that the mini-stations were virtually undefended and very easy to destroy, Anakin had decided to take a squadron out and knock a bunch out in one standard rotation's worth of work. The _Resolute_ was on standby just a little beyond Republic-occupied space – close enough to reach in the case of some kind of mechanical failure, but not close enough for a little one-man fighter's communications system. Luckily for them, the prototype stations didn't appear to be linked, so they couldn't tell each other they were being attacked. The Separatist researchers monitoring them on whatever faraway base would be nearly incapable of catching up before the damage was irreparable. The hope was that, with Republic knowledge of their new development obvious, the whole project would be scrapped – the whole point was surprise, after all.

But still, they did a quick sweep below the atmosphere of every moon or planet housing a station as a precautionary measure. In the midst of his tumultuous thoughts of Council slights, Anakin felt vaguely pleased that this particular moon, boring as it was, had seen the ravages of neither war nor tourism.

It was nearly perfect – and perfectly uninhabited. Temperate forests of lush mixed woodland, foliage in all the colors of the visible spectrum, nestled in sheltered mountain valleys, while towering peaks swept up to snow-capped heights, the melting water from which ran down alpine streams to crystal-clear lakes. The clone pilots had been commenting on it the whole time.

With a jolt, Anakin realized that they had stopped. He opened his mouth to ask if they'd spotted something suspicious when he realized they weren't looking, they were _listening_. He could hear muffled tones in his headset where the clones' helmet receivers were all picking up the noise, but he couldn't quite make out what was being said.

He fought a sudden, unexplainable urge to shoot his fighter into a dive and attempt to get as lost as possible in the thickest part of the mountains – maybe even the forest. He squished the thought. There was nothing wrong. Sure, they shouldn't be receiving any outside transmissions – there was no reason, anyways – but maybe something was wrong with his comm. Maybe this was like that time with Ahsoka, that last time they fought together when there had really been buzz droids all over the underbelly of his fighter and he hadn't realized.

The urge was so strong now that he had to tense his whole body to keep himself in his seat, because _danger_. He opened his mouth again, this time to ask the clones what was up, and was cut off again – this time by his wingman's answer, an answer that made his blood run cold with a deep and deadly chill.

"It will be done, my lord."


	2. I: Secret

**Disclaimer: I'm still not George Lucas, nor do I own Disney, to which my college-student bank accounts can attest.**

**A/N:** I'm still sorry about the lack of more detailed information I gave before posting the first chapter; hopefully what I added to last chapter's author's note will help clear up the confusion. That was the prologue, now the main body of the story begins five years later. I've taken liberties with the family of Wedge Antilles to create an OC; I prefer to be creative rather than a slave to Wookieepedia, though I like to use EU information where I can get it, so I hope I can be forgiven for that. It also feels like there's an unfortunate amount of exposition in this chapter, though I suspect you're at least a little bit interested to understand what's going on in the galaxy, rather than my leaving you completely in the dark.

**Lord Lelouch: **Yes; it makes sense to me that Anakin would be much more cynical or pessimistic in this timeline, at least at that point (he'll be rather different when we meet him again). As you can see, Padme now is, too. Neither of them had many friends, and I can't help but think that they created a lot of each others' happiness. Without each other, then, they'd be much more prone to become bitter individuals. I hope to change that. :)

Thanks to **sodorland**, **Veritas1995**, and **Jedi Master Misty Sman-Esay** for the kind review and Christmas wishes!

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><p><strong>Chapter I: Secret<strong>

**Five Years Later**

Padmé Naberrie Amidala, onetime law-defending Queen and Senator of her home planet of Naboo, celebrated her thirty-second birthday by a spectacular flaunting of Republic law.

Or rather, with a flaunting that would have been spectacular had anyone known what she was up to. As it was, this whole operation was as secret as the rest of hers.

After all, Padmé was familiar enough with the government she had once supported to be able to list off the top of her head the innumerable charges that would be brought against her should she be caught doing what she was doing, leading what she was leading.

Espionage. Forgery of official documents. Destruction of commercial property. Theft of commercial starships. Piracy. Arson. Terrorism.

Vigilantism.

Treason.

After one last, quick briefing with the field operatives she'd chosen for this mission, she headed to the bridge of the medium-sized escort frigate that had been liberated into her little revolutionary fleet.

Padmé and her partners in crime liked to call themselves the Alliance to Restore the Republic. Everyone else in the galaxy liked to call them "those mysterious happenings that are starting to rouse the suspicions of Republic military intelligence."

Well, let them wonder.

After all, the quality of military intelligence had decreased considerably following the collapse of the Grand Army – just another sign that the world she'd tried to make a difference in was decaying faster than Coruscant's public transit system. She stifled an ironic chuckle as she thought of the way her dear, gentle father – already a _former_ Senator when she was just a little girl – had warned her about the kill-or-be-killed world of politics.

How little he knew what would happen to her – to the Republic – in the years following her acceptance of the royal name of Amidala from her people.

A blockade of Naboo, and then an invasion, by the ridiculously over-powerful Trade Federation.

Increasing corruption and the shattering of the Republic. The rise of the Confederacy of Independent Systems and the tensions that grew as the Senate continued to refuse to acknowledge those systems their right to secede.

The secret creation of an army of clones to serve the Republic.

A long and horrifying war.

The revelation that her growing distrust in Chancellor Palpatine was well-placed, as he had been plotting with the late enigmatic former Jedi Count Dooku long years before the war's beginning in an attempt to gain more powers for himself. Most of the administrative branch had been in on it, too.

Widespread belief held that he had wanted to make himself a dictator, to turn on the Separatists and crush them, and use the victory as his crowning glory. One would be surprised at what people would concede to someone who had successfully ended a war.

And then there had been the way he had caused a diversion to make his escape – if the horrible slaughter of hundreds of loyal Jedi could be summed up with a little word like "diversion." The number of Knights and Masters residing in the Temple at the time had been nearly halved. The death toll among those out on the front lines had been even worse – even with warning. Survivors had trickled in. A few had been confirmed dead. Many were still unaccounted for.

Once Palpatine reached his hideout in the Outer Rim, he had called the remainder of the Grand Army back to him, combining it into a hodgepodge force together with the remainders of the droid armies of the Separatists. Holed up somewhere in a cluster of far-flung sectors like a wounded predator in its den, he was nearly untouchable.

The Republic had survived, but barely. They had put together what they could of an army out of planetary defense forces, leaning heavily on the warlike nature of the Mon Cal and the belligerency of the Corellians (who had almost refused out of sheer pride) for the bulk of their new fleet. They had let the Separatists be for now, striking a wary truce as both parties rebuilt. What was left of their non-droid armies were doing their part to keep a wary eye on those sectors in the Outer Rim, too, as were the Mandalorians, who had said nothing to either side of the ended war but seemed instead to be attempting to use the power vacuum of the galaxy to rebuild their warrior state – and with frankly alarming speed.

All that, Padmé supposed, was to be expected in such a situation. As was the paranoia.

After all, if a Chancellor who had been so loved and trusted could have been so despicable, could have come so close to destroying the Republic as they knew it, who else might be hiding secret dreams of tyranny?

But it was the paranoia that was the problem. Though the Senate officially still functioned, as well as the Separatist government, in reality most systems had drawn in to themselves. The galaxy teetered on the edge of anarchy.

And so it was with firm resolve that Padmé had pledged not only her commitment but her full service to the little group of Senators who still wanted to fight for the ideals of democracy.

Alderaan. Chandrila. Corellia. Mon Calamari. Pantora. And a few others.

And Naboo.

Padmé resigned her Senate post three years ago, citing family struggles – and it was true that her father had been very ill very often lately – and more or less disappeared from the scope of galactic events. The fierce, brave Queen who had stood strong for so long had fallen silent, just like that.

Padmé hadn't bothered to take the time to see what kind of sensation her sudden absence had caused. As the new active head of the Alliance, she had more important things to worry about.

She soon found out that the Alderaanians, at least, had been preparing for this for a long time. She wasn't surprised. Anyone who knew Bail Organa as well as she'd come to wouldn't be fooled by his pacifist values for a second. He was not a man to be lightly dismissed.

With the help of a few geniuses he'd recruited, she'd managed to make their operations usually seem like the work of other parties – planetary leaders who had gone rogue, or maybe organized crime – the very people the Alliance fought against.

The innumerable planetary leaders who had gone rogue or turned tyrant.

Organized crime and newly formed drug rings. Slave trafficking.

Paranoid plots to overthrow the Republic government.

She and her people took them all out, and no one was the wiser – at least, not yet.

After all, the biggest problem in the universe was that no one was willing to do what it took to perform justice, to actually enforce the values of right and wrong that they all paid lip service to.

_"__The biggest problem in this universe is nobody _helps_ each other."_

Padmé stopped, unaware that she had been walking more and more slowly, consumed by troubling thoughts.

Now where had _that_ come from? Certainly not from her own mind; it was far too sentimental and naïve for that. It _almost_ felt like memory…

"Padmé? Hey. You said you were coming to the bridge, but you never showed up. Is…is everything okay?"

Kyella Antilles had a hand on her shoulder, friendly concern written on her pretty young face. Padmé realized with a start that she was still a ways from her destination. She straightened, forcing herself to focus on the task at hand.

"I'm fine. I take it we've returned to Lycradel III. I felt us turn around earlier."

"Uh-huh." An intelligent spark lighting her eyes, one of the Alliance's brightest young minds tightened her hold on Padmé's shoulder and more-or-less dragged her toward the bridge. "There was an intact vulture station at Karad V. Defunct and inoperative, but intact – no sign of Republic tampering."

Kyella was one of the geniuses, recruited by her fighter pilot uncle. Padmé sometimes felt bad that the brilliant young woman had dropped out of university with one year left, and had told her so much once, only to be brushed off with a quick smile and a shake of the head. According to Kyella, she felt her intelligence was much better served making the galaxy a better, safer place than it ever had been doing whatever meaningless pet research had been thrown her way by petty corporate funding. The girl was a natural code-breaker, and she lived and breathed strategy and intrigue. She had been the key to the successful completion of many missions.

Kyella dragged Padmé over to one corner of the bridge and practically shoved her at her workstation before flopping down in her chair. She pointed to something on a sensor screen that looked like gibberish to Padmé. "See, we haven't quite come upon the debris field yet, but the pattern of the smaller pieces that drifted after the destruction is entirely undisturbed. To me, this says that the ARC-170 squadron that went to survey the planet never came back out again. Grand Army protocol dictates that they would have come back through this same area when leaving the planet, just as a precaution against the Seps. If we're looking for a lost clone squadron, I'd say this is the place. They would've been too far from their capital ship to receive the snake's transmiss –"

Kyella suddenly froze in her seat, then leaned forward intently toward her sensor screen, fingers gliding swiftly over the controls before freezing again.

"Oh, _by the powers_," she breathed. "I don't _believe_ it."

"What?" Padmé asked, not sure whether to be worried or excited at the younger woman's tone of awe.

"We only stayed just long enough last time to confirm that the mini-station here had been destroyed. But now we're trying to see more of it. Do you see that, just coming into our field of view behind the main body of what's left of the station?"

Kyella pointed and zoomed in even further, and Padmé felt her eyes grow wide.

"Is that?"

"It is." Kyella's voice was still soft with disbelieving reverence. "It's the hyperdrive ring of a Jedi starfighter."

Padmé almost forgot to breathe. This mission had just become ten times more important.


	3. II: Fate

**Disclaimer:** Still not George Lucas or Disney. Sorry to disappoint.

**A/N: **Sorry about the wait. I didn't expect it to be this long, but I had a standardized test to take, followed by preparations for family being here for Christmas, followed by Christmas and family being here. At this point my introverted self has been forced to socialize for so long that she just wants to crawl into a cave for a month or so.

Just to clarify about this AU one last time for everyone: The Phantom Menace happened business as usual, but the mission to Ansion (_The Approaching Storm_, anyone?) went long and Obi-Wan and Anakin weren't available to guard Padmé. Some other Jedi (who knows who, who cares?) took the job, and Anakin and Padmé met only a few times over the course of the war. They've met each other enough times for Padmé to recognize adult Anakin, but other than that they have no relationship to speak of; they don't even know each other well enough to be friends.

About the state of the galaxy: the Republic and CIS (Separatists) both still exist under an uneasy truce, while systems such as Mandalore remain neutral. It's pretty much the wartime boundaries without the war. Although in reality most systems are just looking to their own interests rather than trying to support either failing government. Since there is no Empire, the Alliance (formed through the influence of the Senators from that deleted RotS scene) is not really rebelling against anything, rather they're a vigilante organization trying to support and clean up the Republic. In addition, in this chapter you'll see mentioned the Dark Zone, which is where the "snake" (commonly refers to Palpatine) has taken his closest supporters along with the clone and droid armies that were both secretly under his command during the Clone Wars. He hasn't moved, but no one is quite strong enough to attack him, and no one really knows what he's doing in there...

Thanks to **Lord Lelouch**, **Jedi Master Misty Sman-Esay**, **ambre**, **JACarter**, and **sodorland** for review and encouragement! (Any questions I haven't answered are things I want you to wait to find out :D )

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><p><strong>II: Fate<strong>

Kyella found her voice first, calling over to one of her teammates on the other side of the bridge. "Jaat! Jaat, are you seeing this?"

Her young male Twi'lek friend – from the same university, even – called back with controlled panic lacing his thick accent. "Yes, I see it, but look again! I don't know about you, but I also see the fighters behind it!" He slammed a palm down on a ship-wide comm. "Unfriendly fighters spotted! Gunners to your stations, now!"

Padmé could see the anxiety in Jaat's expression as his skin fearfully paled from deep cerulean to a sort of sky-blue. Rather than try and find what he was looking at with her own sensors, Kyella settled for practically launching herself across the bridge toward his seat, with Padmé right behind her, along with Captain Reddins, who had already confirmed Jaat's hastily-given order to the rest of the ship's crew.

"Are our shields up?" Padmé asked the captain tersely when he reached them.

The middle-aged Corellian nodded gravely. "We came in wary, of course, but to be honest, the _Star Nymph_'s shields aren't particularly strong to begin with. She may be an escort-class ship, but she's not the most well-made one I've commanded. And as you know, my lady, we were expecting to be fighting perhaps a few clones on the ground, not working clone fighters. I mean, by my word, it's been five years! How on earth do they still have fuel?"

"They'd have to have left their ships' engines stone-cold for months and months at a time," Kyella said, brows furrowed in confusion as enemy proximity claxons began to blare around them. Reddins left them to command the navigation crew and gun batteries. Zips of yellow showed where the two outdated but perfectly flyable old Naboo N-1s they had brought with them had left the ship's small hangar bay. The fighters had been a donation from the current Queen of Naboo, who had conveniently "lost" them while they were being moved to be recycled for parts.

"How do you know Palpatine hasn't just established a new base here?" Jaat asked skeptically. "In five years he's done nothing but maintain his defenses. There's got to be some sort of resources or civilization in the Dark Zone – even if he hasn't got Kamino or cloning technologies, a _droid_ factory's not so hard to build – and even though this is still solid Seppie space, we're not all that far from there, just a few sectors away."

Kyella shook her head vigorously. "I was just explaining to Padmé that the drift pattern of the debris from when the station was originally destroyed is undisturbed. They must have come from the moon…"

She trailed off, a thoughtful look on her face, similar to the one she had worn when they had first noticed the hyperspace ring.

"…because of debris and dust!" Jaat was saying. "I think we need to get out of here, and fast, and make sure they don't track us back. Then, if we really must come back, we come back with a real X-Wing squadron in addition to the ground troops. Better yet, we drop an anonymous tip with Republic military intelligence – or Separatist, or _both_ – and let them handle it."

"No," Kyella breathed, and Padmé had turned to ask her what she'd realized when a huge blow knocked them both off their feet as if to prove Jaat's point.

"You see?" he cried, back in panic mode.

The captain appeared at Padmé's side the next moment. "I'm sorry, my lady, but we're going to have to fall back to a waypoint and call a full fighter squadron." In the background, she briefly caught Jaat smirking at an increasingly worried Kyella as they picked themselves up off the ground. "These ARC-170s are still armed with proton torpedoes, and possibly other firepower, used to destroy the mini-stations. We don't know if these two unfriendlies are the only two, our shields can't stand up to torpedoes and the like, and the N-1s aren't as maneuverable as an ARC-170, not to mention they only have forward guns."

Padmé sighed and nodded. "I hate to leave with them knowing we were here, but you're right. We don't know what we're up against. Fall back to the first station in the row for now, but tell communications to be ready to call for backup. We're heading back out as soon as we can."

"No! We _can't_ leave!" Kyella's uncharacteristically defiant proclamation rang out across the bridge, cutting through the hubbub of the attack. Padmé turned to see her with her back to them, still standing straight and stubborn, eyes glued to Jaat's sensor screen. "We have to get down onto the moon."

"Are you crazy? Why in hells would we want to do that? We'd get blown up from the sky by those fighters!" Jaat cried.

Kyella spun to face Padmé and the captain, pointing at the screen. "Don't you _see_? The debris is undisturbed! There's nothing else here, no sign of an enemy base. Those fighters are war-era, unmodified, and you said yourself, Captain, that they still have their arsenals from their last mission. Well," she said, correcting herself, "technically, it was their second-to-last-mission. They stayed here because their final mission – Executive Order 66 – is as of yet unfulfilled. That Jedi is still alive!"

Everyone stood in silence for a couple moments as Kyella's desperate eyes begged for some kind of reaction.

The captain moved first, heading over to the head communications officer and ordering the confused man to try to remove their long-range communications equipment from its station. Padmé braced herself against a railing as the captain moved from communications to navigation, and upon his order the _Star Nymph_ made an about-face dive for the moon's surface, the beleaguered N-1s following a bit behind while trying to hold off the clones. A lucky clone shot had one of them down in the next minute, and a torpedo blast slammed into the rear of the ship even as they broke into the lower atmosphere.

One of the pilots swore loudly as the starboard engine became unresponsive. Padmé found an extra seat and strapped herself securely in place as the bridge crew struggled valiantly to pull the _Star Nymph_ up out of its steep dive. The navigator had had the foresight to take them in over a broad grassland area, rather than forest or mountains, and with a bone-jarring jolt they slammed into the moon's surface and slid, bumping over every little ridge and gully, for at least ten minutes before they came to a complete halt.

Though the clone fighters were, strangely, nowhere to be seen on the still-working scanners, Captain Reddins ordered the quick evacuation of the ship, and the little crew began to take stock of injuries and what supplies were still usable. Of those who had been inside the ship, there were only a few minor injuries – bruises, mild concussions and the like from those who were thrown about the ship during the altercation. Fortunately, the swoop bikes to be used by the field agents had been in secure storage, and all but one were still operable.

A wide swath of breathtaking multicolored forest skirted the foothills of a towering, outswept arm of one of the moon's many mountain ranges. As soon as the assessment was complete, the captain ordered the crew to begin ferrying themselves and the supplies to the cover of the woods in shifts, abandoning the _Star Nymph_ to hide from the enemy among the trees.

Padmé frowned up at the glowering clouds that had begun to gather above them after the crash landing and hugged her arms about herself, shivering in what would have, on Naboo, been a late-autumn chill. She tried not to think about the second N-1 pilot, still unaccounted for and likely blown right out the sky protecting them, as she buckled her blaster holster around her waist and mounted a swoop behind one of the field agents.

Alliance members had died in the line of duty before, of course. The danger of missions in a shattered galaxy was directly related to their importance – and all Alliance missions were extremely important. One or two of the fallen she had known by name.

But this was the first true armed field mission Padmé had accompanied her troops on, and so it was with a heavy heart she remembered that it had been at least five years – at least since the tumult of the Clone Wars – since someone had died before her eyes to protect her or while following her orders.

She had had half a mind to have stayed crouched behind the _Star Nymph_ with a blaster pistol, ready to defend her people against the laughably more powerful clone fighters until all her crewmen and friends had reached the relative safety of the forest. But the logical side of her, which had ruled her since the end of the war, reminded her that she was more-or-less the heart of the Alliance. The safety of her as their leader was more important, strategically, than her grief over a few volunteers.

As rain began to pelt her face as they sped across the prairie toward the mountains, Padmé idly wondered if she had been cutting herself too far off from emotion, if more indulgence in feeling some time back would have helped her to keep the tide of grief at bay a little while longer. But it had been loosed by the pilots' deaths – the pressure that had been building in her for some time now that had found her sleepless at night and distracted from her daytime duties by old memories.

Then she realized something else and this time, she couldn't stop her tears, though they were more-or-less hidden by the rain.

This wasn't the first time someone had died for her. But it was the first time it had happened on her birthday.

The little band stopped in a small but sheltered clearing some way into the trees. The agent she was riding with – Harker, she thought his name was – frowned in concern and helped her dismount the bike when she made no move to do so on her own. Standing there, getting dripped on by trees, she tried desperately to come to her senses and help her people set up camp.

Something warm draped across her shoulders, and with a jolt Padmé realized Harker had fetched her a blanket and was leading her to where the others had already started setting up a shelter.

It was hearing Jaat and Kyella's incessant bickering that brought her back to herself, at least a bit.

"And how do you suppose we find this Jedi, eh?" Jaat snapped as he struggled to drape a massive tarp across the lower branches of two tall conifers.

"Well, we've got the ship's long-distance comm," Kyella said as she inspected tent stakes to see if they were well-anchored in the rich earth. "When we call for backup, we'll send for a ship that has a powerful bioscanner in addition to an X-Wing squadron. Problem solved."

"What, and we sit here till then, hoping those fighters don't decide to firebomb the woods?"

"I assume the captain will have us move to a more remote position at first light tomorrow."

"Great. More walking. More rain. More wet. Just what I wanted."

"You signed up for this job, Jaat – Padmé!"

Kyella hurried up to them and took Padmé from Harker. From the look on her face, Padmé could tell the young woman knew she'd been crying. Her big eyes widened in concern. "Are you okay?"

"I'm fine, just a little tired." She moved to take the blanket off. "Just show me where you need help," she said, but her voice was weaker than she would've liked.

Kyella's face set and she moved the blanket more securely around Padmé's shoulders. "Oh, no you don't. You just rest." Her expression softened. "I know it's been years since you've seen a field mission," she said, low enough that only Padmé could hear.

Reluctantly, Padmé let herself be led into one of the tents and sat down, leaning against a large, smooth tree trunk. She let her mind wander as more of the crew arrived and the camp took shape around her despite the cold and the rain. She idly traced designs in the bark with a finger, feeling herself become sleepier and sleepier until the bark felt almost warm beneath her hand.

The Jedi. She thought about what she knew about Jedi and wondered if the castaway would find them before the Alliance reinforcements arrived.

And then she thought about home, and about something that had been bothering her since they landed.

A lone Force-sensitive on a lonelier world, lost. Her finding them, quite by accident. A downed ship. Repairs to be made. Memories of naïve idealism randomly coming to the forefront of her mind.

There was something about this that felt like déjà vu.

There was something about this that felt like fate.


	4. III: Torn

**Disclaimer:** Not George, not Disney, yadda yadda yadda.

**A/N: **Phew! Okay, this chapter is long and full of a few rather unexpected and possibly crazy plot points. In my defense, these were not things I came up under the influence of New Year's Eve (hehe) or anything like that. Actually, I had most of this planned out way ahead of time when I first conceived of this story (yes, even the crazy bits). However, I wrote the Padme stuff first because it made more sense to me (from a standpoint of narrative and creating suspense) to leave this chapter for a little later. (Also most future chapters will not be this long).

**Lord Lelouch: **Oh, don't you worry. The romance will probably be painfully slow in development.

**Jedi Master Misty Sman-Esay: **No problem! Also, lol yeah I don't see nerdy Jaat as much of an outdoorsy Twi'lek.

**Maria Rose: **Yes, and yes to your questions. Also thank you!

Thanks also to **sodorland **and **JACarter** for the encouraging reviews!

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><p><strong>III: Torn<strong>

The rain pelted Anakin as he struggled to clamber up the rocky incline. He had to get back home and get his stave.

There had been death this evening.

_Ten out of twelve ships downed. Thirty graves._

Now there would be more.

And what was more, he had company.

Blinking hard to keep the water droplets out of his eyes, he instinctively dropped to his knees as the wind gusted, threatening to throw him off the slope. With great care and even more concentration he picked his way among the rocks, wishing not for the first time in five years that he had salvaged a small solar battery, from, say, one of the astromechs, before Jules and Rascal had led their remaining brothers to burn what was left of the pilotless fighters – including his – in a blazing inferno that could be seen on the other side of the mountains.

Yes, a solar battery would have been nice. Ion batteries were good, but they only lasted about a year, and it was very, very hard to mountain-climb with no gear and only one hand, Force or no Force.

With effort, Anakin reached up with his left hand and dragged himself onto the mountain ledge-path that led to the fairly sheltered cave he called home. He lay there for a moment, simply catching his breath, before starting along the treacherous natural walkway, one side of which plummeted down in a near-vertical drop much steeper than the comparatively easy way he'd climbed up.

After only a few steps leaning into the wind, he gave up all thought of dignity, deciding that while going on hands and knees along the ledge would take twice as long, it was preferable to slipping to his death off the rain-slick stone. With practiced ease he tucked the useless mechno into his clothing to keep it out of the way. He still kept it gauntleted, because even though it had no power, he figured if he ever got off this rock it would be easier to find a battery than a whole new arm, so he'd like to keep it as safe from the elements as possible. The gauntlet was still mostly intact, as were all the heavy-duty or leather pieces of his Jedi clothing, except for his boots, which had been through the most wear and were now held together with so many pieces of bark and animal furs that he felt downright prehistoric. Most of his other clothing and his robe still technically _existed_, though their usefulness was debatable. His robe at least he had supplemented with a makeshift coat of sorts made of animal skins – a mishmash of herbivores and carnivores, proof that he had both hunted and _been_ hunted.

The coat, which he wore now, had a hood of sorts – as a Jedi, Anakin had grown fond of hoods – but the wind was much too strong for it to stay in place without him holding it there, and he needed his left hand to guide him along the ledge. So the hood stayed down, and the rain beat down on him and plastered his dirty, tangled, overlong hair onto his head, running down to soak his clothes below.

_Come one, come all, and see the Hero with No Fear crawling on the ground while soaking wet! Look at how the man who was supposed to be your savior spends his time!_

It was the kind of thing that would've filled Anakin with a raw, frustrated anger once upon a time. But he had to live, and he had to endure, and there were some things that just had to be done.

There was no one around to see, anyways.

There was usually no one around at all. Except the forest, if one counted the forest as a someone. Anakin still wasn't sure whether he did or not.

In any case, the forest wasn't about to judge him or laugh or at him.

Anakin had often thought to himself and laughed to himself about how crazy that kind of thing would sound if he said it to someone out there in the more normal reaches of the galaxy. But it was true nonetheless – and it was hardly an ordinary forest.

It was a Force-sensitive forest. And it had saved Anakin's life and sanity.

He had heard before about Force-sensitive animals, but never plants. Plants were different than animals. The Force-using beasts of the world did just that – _used _the Force, if in simple ways: to sense danger or help themselves heal quickly. Things Anakin had unconsciously done before he could walk. But plants, these trees – they were, like all plants, a wellspring of the Living Force, only _so much more so_.

Like the Jedi, they were a bastion of the Light side of the Force.

Unlike the Jedi, they merely existed. They didn't judge, or indoctrinate, or scold. They simply _were_. There was no question of loyalties or motivations. Instead, they gave and gave and gave out of that unending fountain – for support, for aid in meditation.

For comfort and healing.

* * *

><p><em>He knew. He knew everything now. Or almost everything.<em>

_Anakin had felt the massive shift in the galaxy – no, that wasn't right. Not a shift._

_A sudden and violent rending of all he had ever known._

_Anakin sat crouched beneath a rocky outcropping in the shadow of a great peak. From this vantage point he could observe the plain below, at least several klicks in each direction. No one could sneak up on him from down there, and he would hear if one of the fighters came over the mountains behind him._

_It was just as well. He was hardly in a fit state of alertness._

_Anakin gripped his saber hilt tightly in shaking hands._

_It had been all right at first, when there was nothing but shock and confusion. Being shot at. Avoiding dying._

_Realizing that it was his men shooting at him._

_Shooting back._

_Five of the twelve ARC-170s in the squadron had gone down then – fifteen clones. Four more clones he cut down in his escape from the burning wreckage of his fighter._

_It was just as soon as he had reached a relative, wary position of safety – just as soon as the Force cleared a bit from its desperate warning of _danger_, that he had felt it._

_Death._

_The deaths of Jedi. His brothers and sisters. His only family, since his mother's death._

_Shocked deaths. Painful deaths. Confused deaths. Betrayed deaths. Humiliating deaths. Ignoble deaths in the dirt._

_He had not felt all the deaths personally, could not quite pinpoint who had died where and by whose hand – though he _knew_ they had all been betrayed by the soldiers serving under them. The Jedi were scattered across a galaxy at war, and not even his prodigious power was that precise. But a poisonous tide of the Dark side of the Force had swept in an implacable wave across all, and the light of the Jedi was going out._

_That was when the Coruscant garrison reached the Temple, and Anakin felt himself slowly reduced to a shaking ball of helpless horror._

_The knights and masters present in the Temple were valiantly defending their own, but the clones were not targeting the knights and masters._

_They were targeting younglings, apprentices. _Children.

_And they were having at least some success._

_Anakin felt his mind consumed by directionless rage. How _dare _they! He would make them pay for hurting his people, make them suffer for daring to attack when he was not there to defend._

_But he could do nothing, so he sat under a mountain and made sure he would be alive to avenge his fallen._

* * *

><p><em>Two awful, beleaguered, horror-stricken days later, the familiarity of the Dark presence snapped into place as the newly uncovered Force-signature of the Sith Lord who had wrought this madness reasserted itself to recognition.<em>

_Palpatine. Palpatine was the Sith Lord. Darth Sidious._

_A sickening wave of shock and betrayal swept through him._

_And then he really was sick, even though he hadn't eaten in days, when he remembered the proposal he'd been so bitter over not one week earlier._

_Remembered how Palpatine always praised him, always told him all he wanted to hear – even _initiated_ conversations that consisted of little more than complaining about the Council._

_Obi-Wan had seen it – had sensed enough to be wary of Palpatine. And Anakin had been blind, had brushed off the admittedly gentle warnings of the only person who had really cared about him for him and not for his midichlorian count, because he liked what Palpatine had to say and wasn't willing to face the fact that in several key ways, he hadn't yet grown up at all._

_Palpatine and most of the Jedi Council had been fighting over Anakin like children over a pet – and why should he expect anything different when that was how he had treated himself? When he had paid lip service to loyalty, but wagged his tail and happily followed whichever person was currently throwing him the most treats?_

_Anakin curled into himself under a tree and spent the rest of that day and much of the next letting himself be soaked by the rain._

* * *

><p><em>The next day, Yammer found him.<em>

_Anakin emerged from his miserable ball of self-loathing and guilt soon enough to kill before he was killed, but not soon enough to stop the downed pilot from contacting his fellow clones._

_He would have to move._

* * *

><p><em>One week later, he reached other side of the mountains, and a forest at its foothills that gave way to sweeping plains not unlike others he had seen on his trek over the large moon's surface.<em>

_There was something different about this forest, but he didn't have time to pinpoint what it was. He had to discover whether this area was safe, and, if so, establish some kind of shelter where he could focus on gathering food and supplies, and resting. He had to regain his strength._

* * *

><p><em>Obi-Wan escaped three days later. <em>

_Of course, Anakin had used their still-strong (much to the dismay of Council traditionalists) training bond to check on Obi-Wan several times since what he was calling the Great Betrayal._

_Obi-Wan had been captured by Cody and the rest of his legion, rather than attacked with intent to kill._

_It was odd, really, but Anakin wasn't complaining._

_When Obi-Wan escaped, he headed straight in the direction of Lycradel III, where Anakin was. At first, Anakin had been innocently content to wait for rescue._

_Obi-Wan would bring the ship, and they would leave and go find Sidious and confront him together and kill him. And then they would lead the remainder of the Jedi in a crusade across the galaxy to restore peace and sanity._

_It sounded so simple in his head._

_After a while, he realized that Obi-Wan's presence through their bond felt too tense, too harried. Too harried even for one who had just escaped capture – unless he was still being hunted._

_And then Anakin's hope sank into a deep, paralyzing despair._

_Sidious hadn't given up on him yet._

_Anakin remembered the Darkness of what he'd done after his mother's death, that, completely contrary to her entire character, he had brought even more death in her name. And Palpatine had praised it._

_Obi-Wan knew where Anakin had been last._

_Palpatine did too._

_Somehow, despite his best efforts, Anakin couldn't bring himself to trust himself enough to do the right thing this time despite the advantage of knowledge. Consumed in a black hole of doubt, he believed his attachment to his Master was too great for any good to come of this._

_And so, still drowning in the emotional turmoil of the past weeks, he did what seemed to him the best: Obi-Wan, and thus the rest of the Jedi, would believe him dead and not come looking for him. With luck, Anakin would be too damaged to be of any use to Palpatine, who would doubtless not be fooled._

_Obi-Wan was strong, though. Obi-Wan could get through anything, and he would get through this much more easily than Anakin could._

_And so it was that with equal parts fear and resolve, and ignoring the sharp warnings of the well of the Force he had unknowingly fallen into, that Anakin Skywalker reached up to the rock-solid Force bond he shared with Obi-Wan Kenobi and, summoning all the power that flowed in his veins, took hold of it where it emerged from his soul to run to his Master's._

"I'm sorry, Master."

_And snapped it._

* * *

><p><em>Anakin Skywalker came back to himself surrounded – not physically, but spiritually – by a blinding nimbus of the Living Force. Detached, he looked on almost curiously as the shattered pieces of his self were ever-so-carefully picked up and melded back into their places.<em>

_He found, to his great surprise, that despite the gaping hole in his heart, he could breathe. He could think. He was not dead, nor was he a gibbering mess of pain. Astonished, a part of him wondered dazedly what sort of chance could have led him to a place like this, only to have an amused baritone rumble around in his memory, telling him to hold tight, little Ani, because the universe wasn't done with him yet, and nothing happens by accident, because you _are_ the Chosen One, and I'm very, very rarely wrong about things like this._

_There was something comforting about the voice that accompanied the trees in the grove. A sort of protection that he hadn't felt in years._

_It was an impossibility, because there is no self after death._

_But it reminded him strongly of Qui-Gon Jinn._

* * *

><p>Anakin ran his flesh hand over the wood of the stave as the meditative memories faded away into stillness.<p>

The grove had helped him put himself back together. And just like when a bone is broken again so that it can heal straight and true, Anakin felt as though it had been necessary. He still felt like himself, but like a truer, more whole Anakin Skywalker. He was all still there – he was still the boy who had been born a slave and spent his adolescence with the nagging feeling that he would never be good enough – not good in the sense of able enough or accomplished enough, but good in the sense of purity, nobility. Honor. He had feared he was tainted. Cursed.

Now, he no longer feared whether he would ever be good enough. He simply knew that he wouldn't.

There were days that he went about his business, such as it was in the wilderness, content in the knowledge that whether or not Obi-Wan was alive, they would see each other again, one way or another.

There were other days that he didn't leave the cave, but simply spend the whole day crying in a ball for the empty place he didn't know how to fill.

There were days he walked for months looking for the bodies of dead clones, to bury the men who through no fault of their own had been used as pawns, to give them the remembrance they deserved.

There were other days it was lucky none of the still-living clones were in his general vicinity.

There were days he sat in the grove and learned to meditate on the Living Force.

There were other days he climbed from mountaintop to mountaintop and scanned the skies for signs of rescue because he thirsted for vengeance and anything was better than just sitting around.

As the years went by, the other kinds of days became more and more infrequent. But they were always there, and as the days continued to pass, he came to accept that they always would be.

He would never be perfect. Not in the way the Council wanted him to be, or the way Obi-Wan convinced the rest of the world that he was.

Qui-Gon had never been perfect, anyways.

But as the months passed, Anakin knew he was getting stuck. If the Force was testing him, it was time for the next test. He had made great progress, had nearly passed this stage. But he could do little good here except to himself, and deep inside Anakin knew he could never be so selfish. It was time to go out into the galaxy again.

And the idea was, frankly, terrifying.

More than anything else, the fact that Anakin had years ago dismantled his lightsaber spoke volumes of how his distrusted himself as a Jedi Knight, a title he, if he were to be honest, no longer thought he should have been given so soon.

Instead, experimenting with the windfall from the wood in the grove, Anakin had carved a stave of sorts and implanted his saber crystal into the center. He had learned to use it very well, had seen how it helped him use the Force with more precision than he had ever thought possible. And every time he used it, it grew stronger, until he began to suspect he might be able to legitimately use it in a duel. Force-strengthened staves were not unheard of, though so uncommon that Cin Drallig was the only Jedi he knew that could use one proficiently – and that was only because it was part of Master Drallig's job description as Battle-Master. But he had only ever heard of them as physical weapons, never for the purposes he put this one to.

Anakin built a fire in his cave and dried off as best he could. The light was fading fast from the cloud-darkened, still-rainy sky. It would be wisest to wait for tomorrow to head down to the visitors.

This was it, he knew. He was leaving.

He set his stave and his coat and boots to one side, and then, after a moment's pause, put the pieces of his saber hilt into a skin pouch to take with him.

He smiled a little to himself as he drifted off to sleep.

_Well, whatever else happens, I'll probably get a new battery out of it. _


	5. IV: Meetings

**Disclaimer: **I own nothing that you recognize.

**A/N: **There's actually a line in Chapter II (which most people probably didn't catch) that connects to something you'll see here about the Force-sensitive trees. You see? I wasn't kidding when I said I had that planned from the start, however crazy it might be. Forget what I said about future chapters not being long. I'm writing to good breaking points rather than to word counts. Also, sorry for the wait. I had to go back to school (which is a 12 hour drive from my home to my college - America is bigger than most people think, including most actual Americans). And then the semester started, and I got sick, which often happens when the school stress starts up again. Anyway, here you go...

**Thank you so much to everyone who reviewed! **I'll be answering the reviews of actual users by PM from now on (if you have that set to available).

**Guest (Jan 11 review): **Thanks for the kind words and encouragement!

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><p><strong>IV: Meetings<br>**

By the middle of the night, the storm had passed.

Anakin awoke in the very early hours of morning, a while out yet from the dawn. Still tired, and recognizing instantly that it was not danger which had woken him, he drowsily poked his senses out into the world before realizing that he felt warm.

Physically warm, though the last smoldering embers of his fire had died out hours ago.

Mentally warm, too.

Shifting a bit, he realized blearily that he was clutching his stave, which seemed to be the source of the warmth. He blinked and sat up, taking it in his hands. Had he been sleeping _with_ it, like a little child with a soft toy?

Anakin closed his eyes and folded his legs under him in the traditional meditative position. But instead of resting his hands on his knees, he sat the stave diagonally against him, with one end next to his right foot and the length of it leaning on his left shoulder. Clumsily wrapping both arms around it, he bowed his head and touched his brow to the place where he had implanted his saber crystal in the mystical piece of windfall.

The whole stave still pulsed with warmth under his touch, and Anakin opened himself to this connection to what the Force-well was feeling.

Of course. The visitors were encamped in the grove. Vaguely he wondered what they were doing here and why they were on the ground rather than in a ship, but in another moment he let that go. Patience. When he met them, he would learn. Right now the trees had other news for him.

There was one presence in the camp that sparked a particularly strong pull of familiarity. That was what had set off the feeling that had woken him. The trees liked this person, and they were exceptional judges of character. What was more, the feeling they had sent to Anakin to convey this person's presence was _warmth_, of all things.

Warmth – which brought to his mind comfort, safety, healing.

And…home?

Focusing on the Force-signature of the individual, he found that not only were they sleeping by a tree in the grove, their hand rested on the trunk of the very plant from which the wood for the stave had fallen. The closer he got, the stronger the pull became, until it tugged at his very memories and he was jolted out of his meditation with a gasp.

Wide-eyed and shaking, he now leaned on the stave rather than it leaning on him.

It couldn't be! What was _she_ doing here?

_So the Council had convinced her to spy on that traitor from Scipio. Anakin wondered how they'd done it; perhaps they'd had to go to the Chancellor again. He'd heard that was the only way she agreed to go into hiding, back right before the war started._

_Anakin was a little surprised to find himself vaguely sad about the whole business._

_He clearly remembered the way he used to idolize her as a teenager. The brave and beautiful queen who shone so far above everyone else that she would've been well within her rights to look down on everyone she met, and yet was kind, so kind that she had been glad to have met a dirty slave boy who worked in a junk shop on a Force-forsaken crime planet. He had dreamed about her. Fantasized about being not a Jedi, but an ordinary young man, who would someday earn her love and marry her._

_His angel._

_Anakin didn't quite know what he was so sad about. That she had found happiness, if for brief periods of time, with other men? That the ardent flame of his adolescent crush had dimmed to the smoldering embers of casual adult admiration? That she had never met – might never meet – the man the slave boy had become? _

_That he had grown wise enough to realize that the angel was, if an exceptional example of one, just a human woman after all?_

_She was heading to the airspeeder bays this very moment, to leave the Temple for her new mission. He might never have this chance again._

_Turning on his heel, he headed in that direction._

_It was just as well he had, for as he reached the bay he saw her chief of security ushering her towards a speeder Anakin knew from experience tended to jostle its passengers on tight turns._

_Hurrying up to the pair, he tried to smile through unexpected nerves._

_ "__Not that one, milady! I mean, it works, but it's hardly to the standards of someone like you. I'd suggest…" He turned and pretended to scan the neatly lined rows of airspeeders before theatrically pointing to a blue-and-silver one whose innards he'd perfected himself. "…that one! She's by far the most trustworthy in our fleet." He held out his arm for her to take as she debarked the craft._

_She smiled, nearly laughing outright at his over-the-top gallantry. Her eyes widened when she took his arm, and Anakin felt his own smile falter as her small hand rested on his own of hard metal and churning gears._

_But she recovered her smile in an instant, and simply said, "How very noble of you, Sir Knight," and Anakin knew she wasn't just talking about the speeder._

_He saw her off and still stood a while by the wide open bay doors to the cityscape beyond._

_ "__Sir Knight."_

_So she _hadn't _recognized him._

_What was the use of being the most famous Jedi in the galaxy, anyways?_

The trek down to where the visitors – including Padmé Amidala – were just beginning to stir was not nearly as treacherous as it would have been last night, though it was still slower going than Anakin would have liked, what with the rocks still slick from the rain and the earth churned to slippery mud.

He reached the edge of the camp just as the light from the star of the Lycradel system began to peek over the horizon of the eastern plains and filter through the trees of the grove. He could feel the branches rejoicing, straining toward the nourishing sunshine.

He picked a sentry and headed toward them, being sure to make enough noise that he didn't startle them into shooting. When he heard a cry of "Halt! Halt, or I shoot!" he knew he'd been spotted. A man and a woman, both with blasters drawn, appeared out of the trees. They were wearing matching, but unmarked armor. It was odd – even mercenaries usually wore some sort of troop or team colors. They were clearly soldiers, but whose?

The woman, sharp-faced, with black hair pulled back into a severe bun, kept her rifle firmly aimed at Anakin's chest, but the man lowered his. The man was taller and younger than the woman, though he still looked to be in his early thirties. He had short brown hair, brown eyes, and just a bit of stubble – all in all, fairly nondescript. On the _outside_, at least.

Anakin found he could assess them in a second.

The woman was hard and unforgiving. She believed in little other than merciless ethics, the stark juxtaposition of right and wrong and the duty to defend the right and condemn the wrong. She was that unpleasant mixture: an unkind idealist.

The man, on the other hand, was kind and gentle. He cared as much about others' souls as he did about their rights and freedoms. He was brave, and he liked to laugh, and – here Anakin caught a glimpse of a fair-haired woman, her belly swollen with an unborn child, reading from a datapad, sitting in a window seat – he loved his wife. He would be a very good father.

Anakin turned to the man. "What is your allegiance, soldier? Why does your troop make camp on Lycradel III? And what business does the Senator from Naboo have here? Your wife is lovely, by the way. You two should be very proud; I'm sure you'll be wonderful parents."

The man slung the large sniper rifle he had been holding back over his shoulder. "That's the Jedi, then." He looked at his companion. "Oh, for the gods' sake, Macheal, stand down."

"But how do we know he's a Jedi, Harker?"

Harker looked at her as though she'd grown a second head, and then turned back to Anakin. "We were shot down by a couple of old ARC-170s on our way down to the planet. We could've run while still in space, but Command – that's the _former_ senator and her analysis team and the captain – thought that maybe the Jedi was still alive. We've contacted our people, and they're sending reinforcements and transport. I'll be honest, I didn't quite believe we'd find a live Jedi here, sir."

Macheal reluctantly lowered her rifle as Anakin approached and lowered the hood of his coat.

Harker's eyes widened, and then he stood to attention with a sharp _snap_ of boot heels, raising his right hand in a salute. Anakin could feel the awe coming off him in waves and grimaced. "Please don't do that."

Macheal raised an eyebrow. "What, is he important?"

Harker reluctantly stood at ease and shot her an incredulous look. "That depends on whether you think the Hero with No Fear is important or not."

She blinked. "Are you trying to tell me that's _Anakin Skywalker_?"

Anakin supplied her answer. "I'm kind of famous for being really _hard_ to kill."

Though a smile played around Harker's mouth, he still seemed at a loss, his earlier confidence gone in the presence of someone he clearly admired greatly. "Is…ah…shall I escort you into camp, Master Jedi?"

Anakin fought to keep from scowling. After five years of reflection, he had realized that many of his actions during the war were not that praiseworthy, after all. If he was going to get this kind of reaction from half the people he met, this was going to be very, very difficult.

"Fine. Just…just don't salute me again, okay? And don't call me Master. Or Jedi."

"Um…alright. What _do_ you want me to call you, sir?"

"By my name, would be fine."

"Well, then. Uh, right this way...Skywalker."

Anakin supposed asking to just be called by his first name was too much, so he fell into step with Harker as the soldier led them through the woods.

"So what's the story with your troop? Who are 'your people'?"

As they headed further toward the clearing that housed the camp, Anakin got a crash course in the Alliance and the state of the galaxy at large.

It was both much worse and much better than he had anticipated.

Everything had gone to anarchy, so much so that an illegal vigilante group was running around risking their lives and freedom doing the things that had once been the work of the Jedi. Palpatine was still free. Many, many Jedi had been killed – though he'd already known that.

But, at the same time, Palpatine was not the ruler of the galaxy. He had been ousted from Coruscant, if not defeated. The Jedi still existed, even though they had suffered a grievous blow. The Republic still struggled on, even if it had lost power and the trust of its people.

They _could_ struggle on. Eventually, rebuild and reestablish order.

A few yards from the camp, Harker stopped and asked him if he had any questions before they joined the others.

There was one question Anakin had been dying to ask since he knew that these visitors were supporters of the Jedi, that they fought for the Republic, even if they did so outside its laws. But faced with the opportunity, he found himself tongue-tied, paralyzed with fear that he might not like the answer.

"You guys keep up with the Order, right? Their official actions and stuff?"

"That's right. If only to stay out of the way of the Jedi while we carry out our missions."

"So…do you know if…that is…have you heard whether…" He trailed off.

Harker grinned and Anakin felt himself flooded with relief of a hurt that had waited five years for healing and a huge piece of his shattered world fell into place again.

"Of course we have. Master Kenobi's definitely alive, has been this whole time."

It took real physical effort not to slump into a limp pile on the forest floor and cry. The sheer release of an anxiety he had been holding in for five years felt as though it was going to turn Anakin's muscles and bones to mush. A niggling bit of worry still wondered how badly he'd hurt Obi-Wan when he'd decimated the training bond, but he shoved that thought into a dark corner of his mind for now. If Obi-Wan was out there protecting people and was still able to sit on the Jedi Council, he was probably fine.

Probably.

Anakin recognized Padmé Amidala the minute he stepped within the circle of the clearing, conferring with a middle-aged man he guessed was the captain of the downed ship. She was as beautiful as he remembered, though her Force-signature felt more sorrowful than it had been during his brief interactions with her throughout the war years.

It wasn't until Harker cleared his throat in the silence that Anakin realized the camp had indeed fallen silent. He glanced around, seeing more soldiers and a lot of ship's crew staring at the newcomer with awe as they all realized he was the stranded Jedi, alive even after five years marooned on an uninhabited moon. From the looks on a few faces, some recognized him.

The former Senator Amidala headed over with the captain in tow.

When she neared him, her eyes widened, and Anakin suddenly, inexplicably, unexpectedly found himself staring down the barrel of a sleek, silver blaster pistol.

At his side, Harker was protesting wildly. "But, my lady, this is the Jedi we're looking for. And it's General Skywalker –"

"I know." Her voice was calm and collected, cool and firm. Her dark eyes flashed.

Anakin suddenly knew what she was going to say next before she said it, and it nearly broke his heart.

In all his fears about facing the outside world again, he'd thought mostly of himself. Would he try to rejoin the Jedi? Would he go after Palpatine alone? Would he ever feel worthy to rebuild his lightsaber or rejoin old friends? Would he be able to make a difference in the galaxy without falling into his old ways of violence and rage and deep, abiding anger?

He had never thought about how people would react to seeing him alive.

A few wouldn't recognize him, even with his damningly iconic facial scar and gauntlet.

Some would react like Harker, in a revival of the old blind hero-worship.

And some would react like Padmé. They would remember.

She sent a sharp glare over to the assembled Alliance crew. "Yes, he's Anakin Skywalker. But have the rest of you forgotten that Anakin Skywalker was in Palpatine's inner circle?"

Even though he'd seen it coming, he couldn't help but flinch and look down, head bowed, heart heavy.

Because no matter how much he'd never wanted anything Palpatine had done to happen, and no matter how much of it would never directly be his fault, he had been close to the Sith Lord, had been around him a lot. And as long as the ashes of those younglings lay cold in the Jedi Temple's Halls of Memory, which would be as long as he lived, the question would haunt him.

How could he not have _known_?


End file.
